Nolan Dalla also has a dog in this fight

Pretty much this ^^. Keeping with the South Park theme, the whole thing came across pretty much like the "Smug Alert" episode.

Maybe it wouldn't have bothered me if the focus was "stop the fighting" or "save the innocent lives", but the way it was done, IMO, was just as stupid as Daniel's blanket pro-Israel statements.

These shirts statements are far worse than curse words or nudity, they involve a war were people are dying! They're totally biased towards one side and unless the people wearing them are %100 educated on both sides of this conflict dating back basically since history has been documented they shouldn't be adding on to the ignorance from one specific point of view. Colman and Bousquet both have people that follow and respect them and a lot of people see the messages that people they follow and respect promote and auto agree with there points of views, therefore the cycle of ignorance continues.
IMO if they wanted to take a stance with this particular issue a better message would have been "Peace in the Middle East" or "the person on the other side is Me my, Brother, Father, Mother, Sister, Child" with both flags of the respective countries involved on the shirt.

And this has nothing to do with what place they finished. And I do agree with people being able to wear what they want, but if the host whatever it may be, doesn't want to allow something then that's there right as well.

Just as businesses have the right to restrict certain types of attire should they choose to, Pokerstars or other event organizers can, if they choose, do the same. This does not mean they should, but they can do so and this event might be the trigger to more of them doing so.

Some people in this discussion are too invested in what these specific T-shirts said. It does not really matter; what matters is the general principle and the extreme possibilities such as advocating past or future genocides, extreme racist views, etc. These not only offend but might seem to suggest that the event itself promotes these views, even with disclaimers saying otherwise.

I hope we never reach the point where an extreme dress code is used but asking or requiring that potentially controversial attire not be worn for televised events seems reasonable.

Final Table -- Mandatory white tuxedo for any high roller provided by the sponsor (or bring and wear your own if you are a big-hitter). The optics would look fantastic and would settle the T-shirt issue once and for all without the encroachment of politics.

The more I read responses and reflect on how I feel about one side or the other, the more I realize how hard it is to feel exactly one way as it is definitely a touchy subject. A big part of me understands why the exact shirts worn might not fit the bill because of the reactions they evoke, and a big part of me wants to see a time and place where such shirts don't evoke the type of reaction they did because we are without conflict/worldly dilemmas, so the reasoning isn't always so cut and dry and how to go about it really isn't either... With that said, I would've liked to see it handled in a different way such as in form of contract as people were clearly put-off in this fashion.

If you are worried about extremists then just say "no racist or genocidal attire." We never had to previously, but go ahead.

As others have mentioned, "no political attire" is overbroad and insulting to any thinking person.
It's also unhelpful to the PPA.
It's also open to selective enforcement, which will only cause more so-called controversy.

I think we can let the players police themselves here. This is why I've always been against the idea of a dress code. Respect the players.

+1

You were clearly not talking about media coverage in the US. You were talking about where "it happened", that it would not have been an issue "if the tournament was held anywhere in Europe".

You still didn't realise your error when it was pointed out to you. Wake up son.

As have all of yours.

Dalla equates them only in the sense that both are examples of people being interested (rather than disinterested) in a given current event. He is not stating nor implying that the two events have equal magnitude.

For what it's worth, I'm sure he'd agree with this 100 percent. Any thinking person would.

It's insane mostly because that's not what his comment was. Wearing a T-shirt is simply emblematic of — and third in line behind — forms of expression (following "stranding up" and "speaking out"). Agreed, a T-shirt in itself would accomplish very little on any issue, severe or superficial, except to generate a modicum of awareness. But the person wearing a T-shirt is an activist who effect change by the sum total of his actions. Thus, the type of person who would have worn anti-UIGEA sentiment on a Beefy-T is also the guy who would have pestered his elected officials, rallied support from other players, or done other actions that could have made a difference*. That's all Nolan is saying there.

It IS a bit heavy-handed, though.

No, here's the part of Dalla's blog — which I otherwise mostly liked — that I have to take issue with (emphasis mine):

The bolded part is ultimately drove PokerStars to its decision, whether we or Nolan like it or not. At this point, their business interest lies in people watching the telecast (or live stream, as the case may be). So Nolan's advice to look the other way runs completely counter with what PokerStars' desire to maximize viewership.

Long story short, I agree with Nolan that PokerStars may have "gotten it wrong," but it's also their right to get it wrong. What goes on in this event is quite literally their business, and so they get to make the rules. Granted, I'm not exactly a fan of the 51st rule, but Busquet and Colman agreed to it when signing up for this thing. For this event, anyway, they should have to abide by it.

Then the Company also shouldnt have its "Face of the brand" make much more baiting posts about the same issue on Twitter, or else it would appear the company has a Party line

I just about agree with the Pokerstars guy that these t shirts shouldn't have been allowed.

But they MUST be consistent.

If someone rolls up in a "Israel has the right to defend itself" shirt or "Stop abortion" shirt, then these must be banned too.

In fact anything remotely political, even if 99.9% of people would agree with the statement like "Sheldon Adelson sucks" shirt should be prohibited.

It's not Pokerstars job to decide what is potentially offensive and what isn't.

Either everything is allowed or nothing.

My father is a politician back in the UK. So if I wear a T-shirt with a giant picture of him, are they going to implement a rule that you can wear a T-shirt with a picture of your relative as long as that relative is not a politician, or alternatively a rule that you can't wear a T-shirt depicting a politician unless you are related to him? The London EPT will probably go out on TV just before David Cameron defends his position as Prime Minister in the UK general election. If someone wears an old Hartlepool United shirt with "CAMERONS" (beer sponsor) written in block capital letters is that political, commercial or neither?

They are going to have to keep getting involved in taking controversial positions on what in their opinion is and isn't political, achieving the opposite of the effect they desire.

By the way, swastikas or holocaust denial would breach broadcasting rules and other laws in a number of European countries, so Pokerstars still has to ban these whatever and doing so does not force them to take a corporate position to specifically ban or not ban anything else.

Well who cares - they just won´t have to. I´d bet a lot of money that nobody ever put Pokerstars into that spot before. Colman and Busquet must have been the first poker millionaires to go full politard on a poker live stream. The fact that they got away with it is just further prove that Pokerstars never saw anything like it and hence didn´t know how to react to it.

I think Pokerstars made a mistake allowing these T-shirts in the first place. Fortunately, they realized it, and in the future, viewers of their shows will be spared from smuggy political statements that deflect attention from the game. And it has nothing to do with freedom of speech : it's their shows.

Allowing these in-your-face statements on polarizing subjects like this one could only cripple their ratings, since lots of viewers will have a painful experience watching it. And I was one of them. Was very excited about this final table but just couldn't watch it due to these "FREE PALESTINE" advertizements. (Sorry for bad english)

I disagree that blank statements like these promote researching, they make it look like the "correct opinion" is a simple one and one that does not require research.

I have read hours and hours about the cluster**** that is the Israel/Gaza situation and I still don't feel like I am confident enough to try to convince people of my opinion on the matter, I'm not even exactly sure what my opinion is on the current conflict. If I were to come across someone who is not educated on the matter but is very interested in it (who the hell is still left that fits in that bracket?) I would try to give them a short history lesson and then tell them what events led to the cluster**** of the recent conflict. I don't think blanket statements like "Free Gaza" are very relevant in the current situation. Obviously the situation is terrible in Gaza atm but a solution isn't something as simple such as "hey Israel back off and let them be bro". What we have today is the result of the ****ed up situation in the region for the last few decades and now we're stuck in a situation where there is no clear solution that guarantees no harm for both parties.

I sure as hell don't know what a solution is what would work, and the political world seems to agree since I haven't heard very good proposals in the media either. I repeat: blanket statements such as Free Gaza in my opinion don't help creating awareness in the current situation, since it is a ridiculously simple statement that makes it seem like forming the correct, ethical opinion on the conflict is so easy that it can be summarized in 2 words.

Seriously? This is a poker event not the olympics. History will surely side against the war crimes of Israel, but if we ever know the full truth about this conflict history will most likely also show that there was no good guy in this conflict. Just evil and evil with a huge amount of innocent people stuck in between on both sides. But it is way too early to tell what history will side with. There is way too much propaganda from both sides at the moment.

Good post.

Good for them.

These dangerous subversives clearly need to be stopped, because freedom of speech is a really bad thing.

This idea of a ban is ridiculous. Enforcement of it is going to generate so much negative PR the first time some shows up in a breast cancer awareness shirt., an Amnesty International shirt, or wearing an American flag. C'mon, everybody on very side of every issue is going to have a field day with this. It will be never ending source of NVG threads!

Colman lol, lol, lol. go enjoy life. drive on your boat shirtless and party in Brazil while you are young. you are not ever going to make a difference in the Palestine - Israel conflict. If Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, etc. etc. could not negotiate a peace Dan ****ing Colman certainly is not going to.

lol. A painful experience? Because of 2 words on a t-shirt? Sounds like the problem is with you.

OH NO, SOME PEOPLE HAVE A DIFFERENT OPINION THAN, AHHHHH IT MUST BE STOPPED

Seriously, stop being such a sensitive fanny.

As a french, being already consistentely exposed to propaganda regarding this conflict, it just tilts me to find it again on a freaking poker show I just wanted to enjoy watching.

Would think the same if it was a pro-israeli statement. It's just not the place. And btw, I would be curious to know what percentage of their winnings have they donated to "save Palestine". Probably zero. Just pure smugness.

I agree with the bold. Other than that, this is a reflection of how mixed up everyone really is, on both sides. I mean, these guys (Busquet & Colman) seem plenty intelligent enough to have thought out what they were doing, and to have a clue as to what's going on overseas; these are actual humanitarian movements that these shirts represent, whom I assume have some sort of idea of why they are a movement.

To say that these 3-4 syllable statements summed up in two words are geared towards making the problem seem like an easy thing to tackle is to be a bit closed-minded imo. Furthermore, to say that actions such as these don't spark awareness in people, is to overlook the reaction as proof. What you have now is thousands of people voicing their opinion on the matter when they otherwise wouldn't have.

Again, Idk know the exact answer either, but I do feel that having these conversations and debates is at least part of it. If we don't voice ourselves someone else will for us, and if we're not the ones drawing the lines then we're just following orders. I can't help but feel passionate about this with long-lasting corruption and turmoil in place in so many aspects of this world while so many say the same old thing that there's nothing we can do about it and turn a blind-eye while the cycle continues. We've come a long way in many aspects so I'm hopeful but we've got a long long ways to go, and seeing this turn out the way it did is another step in the right direction. Yeah the audience is smallish here and on the stream, in relation to world issues, and it might not seem at a glance that this conversation matters in the big picture of things, but then how do things like war, poverty, and hunger vanish if we don't engage at every level? I'm hopeful that it's an inevitable thing that we're gradually getting closer to, I am hopeful....

if it disturbs you, then walk away

I am happy that Bousquet wore the shirt. Now I wont have to listen to him host another poker show. I just never liked him. His opinions just seemed wrong. Like when he defended Coleman not giving interviews. Anyone disagree with me that he wont be hired by ESPN etc because of this? Whether they agree with that or not.